San Francisco, CA – YIMBY Law announced on Wednesday that it has launched a dashboard that tracks Housing Element compliance and the implementation process.
“This dashboard will provide useful information for advocates, researchers, journalists, and pro-housing organizations who are tracking cities and counties as they implement their housing plans,” the group explained in a release.
The dashboard compiles multiple data sources from the California Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD) as well as the US census.
The dashboard, YIMBY Law added, “will allow community members to hold their local governments accountable to meeting their plans and encourage them to permit the minimum number of homes required to accommodate community needs.”
“We’re thrilled to launch this tool so anyone can help enforce fair housing plans across the state,” said Jack Farrell, Research Attorney at YIMBY Law. “Cities will no longer be able to get away with not implementing their Housing Elements. Not with so many of us paying
attention.”
The page on the city of Davis, shows that the city is in compliance with its Housing Element, which was finally certified after three attempts last year, but is making slow progress on meeting its housing targets.
YIMBY Law explained that Housing Elements are plans that every local jurisdiction in California is responsible for making every eight years. These plans must meet their anticipated housing needs based on projected population growth, economic opportunity, and other community factors.
“These plans must include homes for people and families at every income level, with the number for each income level depending on the community’s minimum need,” the release explained.
YIMBY Law and YIMBY Action—with the support of several additional pro-housing nonprofits—launched the Campaign for Fair Housing Elements in 2021 to ensure cities and counties across the state create and implement compliant plans that allow for millions of new homes.
Since then, YIMBY Law has recruited and supported over 600 watchdogs, filed five Housing Element lawsuits, and sent hundreds of letters informing cities of law violations.
Previously, cities have created unrealistic plans on paper that do not result in new homes. Housing advocates had no resources to track these plans and had to search hundreds of pages of planning documents to hold their cities to account.
The dashboard will “highlight which cities are falling short and empower advocates to hold them accountable to creating and implementing fair Housing Elements.”
Now that all local jurisdictions are required to have approved housing plans in place, the Campaign is launching the dashboard to enable watchdogs, community members, and other stakeholders to monitor key decisions and help identify when localities fall out of compliance. It will also make it easier for the Attorney General’s Office, the Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD), and YIMBY Law to hold cities accountable when they ignore the law.
YIMBY Law will “continue to monitor city and county behavior with the support of dedicated watchdogs and community members to ultimately ensure that the Housing Element process results in hundreds of thousands more homes across the state.”
“For decades, exclusionary cities have gotten away with not building housing for anyone other than the wealthy, but recent improvements in Housing Element law and the presence of dedicated watchdogs have changed that,” said Sonja Trauss, Executive Director of YIMBY Law. “With the dashboard, it will be even easier to make sure cities follow through to actually allow homes for people at all income levels.”
